Oh yeah? There are two problems with this. First, the 513m never was, and never was claimed to be, real money. It isn't actual pounds and pence that a principal youth officer can rub their hands over and chuckle: "I'm rich, I'm rich, it's all mine ..." It is an accountancy calculation based on a complex formula-funding share. That is different from money.
The second problem is that the 513m is not a youth service figure. It is the amount allocated to a youth and community sub-block of the education budget. That includes community education and spending on student support in further education.
Are community education and further education student support part of the youth service? They are not.
It is odd that a green paper, which is meant to be a consultation document not an annual report, should bother blowing the Government's spending trumpet at all. But it is seriously upsetting when it is clouded by such sloppy claims.
The common view is that the commitment to increased spending on the youth service does seem to be genuine. So it is a shame to see such inaccuracy in the figures. And that's a real shame, not a formula of shame calculated by accountants.
While the Home Office was busying itself making laws to clear drunken louts off our streets, it saw some tidying up to be done over young people's drinking habits. So it stuck a new power in its amendment to the Criminal Justice and Police Act 2001.
This enables the police to stop underage drinkers and "to confiscate their unopened bottles and cans where the young person is drinking, has been drinking, or intended to drink alcohol". Which covers most possibilities ...
But why do this? The press statement says it "reflects concerns from the police, and others, that leaving alcohol in the possession of underage drinkers who are causing a nuisance will allow them to continue drinking and create nuisance once the police officer has moved on".
Doh! Just to remind you, the date of the Confiscation of Alcohol (Young Persons) Act was 1997. Has it really taken six years for ministers to figure that out?
